It’s an entire book length of material, but in short, for built up areas drivers are forced through street to design to be higher alert to their surroundings. EX: chicanes in the road, speed tables, brick roads, narrow streets, small/tight turn radius, no turn on red, etc. These all work together to make a system that is amongst the safest in the world for pedestrians, and by happenstance has the happiest drivers.
Also, bike traffic and vehicle through traffic are separated on different networks, so a conflicts are minimized.
Which requires a long and detailed answer that can be found by simply googling "Dutch traffic engineering standards" which leads you to an entire wealth of information.
Under $1000:
A road bike. I live in LA (county) and the default is to drive everywhere, but here's the thing: driving sucks. We famously don't have great bike infra, but I thought, would I go more places if I didn't hate getting around? For trips up to a couple miles, biking is faster than driving, and I never have to worry about parking.
Ergo stuff. A kinesis keyboard, a logitech ergo mouse, a standing desk and mat. Between these, I've probably headed off carpal tunnel and back problems by years.
I'm in Portland and I say that anyone that lives on the Eastside within 82nd and works within those bounds should just get a bike, it's sooo much faster to get around the city. We have infamously small city blocks so all those intersections make driving a car very slow through the city and for good reason as it's safer. If you hop on a bike and take a greenway that has all the stop signs facing perpendicular traffic you can zoom around the city no problem. It's the exact same amount of time (from door to desk) for me to drive to work as it is to bike to work (including the shower). It's just shy of 7 miles. No brainer.
I think novels should be for books, and long form journalism with this mountain of exposition before the point should die. It just feels like this author couldnt make a living writing novels and burdens us in an online newspaper instead.
It did get me interested enough to ask chatgpt what Crundwell did. Rita Crundwell, for an article that also couldnt get to the point about her first name due to some other ritualistic journalism idea that merely frustrates
The main point of this article is to inspire a bit more empathy and consideration for those with disabilities. He knows he's privileged, and that the 4/5 people who aren't currently disabled (by Sarah's count) are too; he's trying to help the 4/5 see themselves in the 1/5, too. Doesn't feel constructive to call him out for it
I used to work at a Fortune 500 company. While there, I gave up my car and began walking to work.
A teammate offered to pick me every morning but our schedules were a little different, so she couldn't take me home. There was a program for people ridesharing, some goody-two-shoes, pie-in-the-sky, "Let's promote the idea that people need to drive less" thing and she qualified for a special parking space for ridesharing with me.
And then someone else offered to take me home and also applied to this program and did not get the special parking space she was hoping for. Instead, the first woman lost her special parking privileges.
After that, I stopped participating in all the company programs aimed at rewarding people with cars for driving less by walking, biking, ridesharing, etc. for fear that as someone entirely without a car, no matter what I did, I would somehow be in violation of the rules which were geared towards people who owned cars and by default drove alone.
I happen to be seriously handicapped myself and my condition is congenital. If he is more entitled to give his views on this topic than I am, then something is extremely wrong.
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